PARIS — For all his reforming zeal, Emmanuel Macron's legacy as president of France is likely to be defined by a single, dark question: whether he can manage the terrorist threat against his country without ceding to authoritarianism.

All Western leaders are concerned by the potential for such horror. But none faces a threat quite so pervasive, constant and insidious as Macron does in France, and probably will do for the rest of his five-year term. "Even if Daesh [ISIS] ends up losing its territorial foothold in Syria and Iraq, it will take time to reduce the threat," reads a statement on the French interior ministry's website.

Macron's solution, which even advisers admit is flawed, was to introduce a new anti-terrorism bill that reproduces most of the important features of the state of emergency. Passed into law on Tuesday, it has been the subject of some of the sharpest debate between MPs since Macron took power. It's easy to understand why: The law expands police powers considerably, and permanently, ensuring the continuation of practices that both Amnesty and Human Rights Watch have denounced as discriminatory against France's Muslim population.

Since January, France has suffered no fewer than 11 terrorist incidents related to radical Islam.

So now Macron faces another challenge, this one political in nature, but no less risky: He will become known as an authoritarian president who is willing to sacrifice the rights of some citizens in order to avoid being seen as weak.

"The state of emergency [imposed after the November 2015 attacks in Paris] may not be ideal, but to let it lapse would have been a major political liability, and to leave it in place would have kept France in a legally ambiguous situation," Heisbourg said.

Diligence and luck

Stated in numerical terms, the threat is even plainer: Since January, France has suffered no fewer than 11 terrorist incidents related to radical Islam, including a shooting on the Champs Elysées in Paris three days before the presidential election.

Security forces thwarted an additional 14 attacks, including a car loaded with gas canisters ready to blow up next to the Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris, and another one Tuesday in Marseille. In all, French authorities are keeping watch over 18,500 individuals suspected of being sympathetic to terrorist groups, with as many as 200 returnees from war zones in Iraq and Syria roaming the country.

If no mass-fatality attack has succeeded since the massacre on Nice's Promenade des Anglais on July 14, 2016, it's largely down to the diligence of anti-terrorism investigators and the DGSI intelligence service, which is now receiving a major upgrade — and luck.

For Macron, there is no escaping the threat. Inexperienced on security issues when he took office, the president quickly understood how important anti-terrorism would be for his political survival. In his first major policy speech, Macron declared that defeating terrorism would be his top priority, and soon announced the creation of a task force directly under his command at the Elysée Palace, charged with keeping him constantly up-to-date on security threats.

He also signed off on an extension of Operation Sentinelle, a costly scheme to patrol public places with soldiers. Its efficacy against terrorism is disputed (soldiers are increasingly targeted by terrorists) but it remains popular with the public.

And yet there is a problem no new agency could solve: the fact that, 18 months after the Bataclan concert hall massacre, France is still living under a state of emergency, which has been renewed five times.

If a major attack comes on Macron's watch, citizens would demand more forceful action against terror. Yet the state of emergency would have defeated its own purpose, and the only judicial weapon left in the president's arsenal would be to declare a "state of siege" — which hasn't been invoked since the Algerian War — or martial law. On the other hand, to allow the state of emergency to lapse amid constant threats would expose the president to accusations of being weak and naïve.

"So there is this law, which is not perfect ... But you need to look at real-world alternatives. What else was there to do?" said Heisbourg.

Innocence lost

What Macron chose to do was to give his police forces unprecedented powers to raid, question and detain people suspected of terrorist activity, without the need to consult a judge or magistrate.

Under his Socialist predecessor François Hollande, France became known as a country that practiced religious and ethnic profiling on an industrial scale against suspected terrorist sympathizers. Dozens of French Muslims filed cases for wrongful detention and excessive use of force, arguing that police raids at their homes or workplaces had destroyed their reputations and livelihoods, prompting critical reports from Amnesty and Human Rights Watch.

Under Macron's laws, the quick-and-easy raids denounced by rights groups will be included in police forces' regular toolkit. Officers will be able to "visit" — raid — and question individuals suspected of terrorist activity for up to four hours, without having to consult a judge beforehand. In such cases, no warrant is required, and the definition of what stands for "terrorist activity" is vague enough to cover just about anyone.

French gendarmes stop a car at a checkpoint in Sospel, near the Italian border | Marco Bertorello/AFP via Getty Images

Under the state of emergency, police could place suspects under effective house arrest, likely excluding them from holding down jobs. The new law relaxes this capability, restricting suspects to a given geographic area where they can be watched to allow them to keep jobs and continue their family life. A person will have to check in with a police handler once per day, as opposed to three times previously; turn over all their telephone numbers and passwords; and the total duration of the surveillance period is now limited to one year.

The government says such measures are necessary in a context of generalized threats against public safety. But opposition politicians point out that targeted intelligence operations, not house arrest, harassment and random raids, are usually to thank for thwarting attacks; and that the law's real effect will be to make France's non-white population, which is already subject to higher-than-average unemployment rates, feel even more discriminated against and excluded from the mainstream.

"Every day I meet young people who are stopped on the basis of their face," said Bastien Lachaud, an MP from the far-left France Unbowed group of Jean-Luc Mélenchon. "Non-whites are going to be stopped more often."

Macron addresses the United Nations General Assembly on September 19 | Drew Angerer/Getty Images

An MP from the Socialist Party, Olivier Dussopt, suggested including in the bill an explicit prescription against racial profiling, but his amendment was rejected on the basis that the Constitutional Court has already outlawed racial profiling — which activists say does not make it any less routine or troubling.

In an interview last month with POLITICO, the head of the Council of Europe said he saw no problem with Macron's anti-terrorism bill, and had been impressed by the president's interest in human rights. "He demonstrated a real personal investment in the question," said Thorbjørn Jagland.

To hell with Schengen

Yet even if Macron's law passes muster with Europe from a rights perspective, it could test the bloc's tolerance to breaches of its "four freedoms," notably the freedom to travel between EU countries without being stopped under the Schengen Agreement.

Under Macron's law, border security will be able to conduct identity checks at major crossings and within a 20-kilometer perimeter of selected sites to be established via decree, in defiance of Schengen. France has been conducting such border checks since the Bataclan attack, under an authorized two-year exception to the Schengen rule. The exception is due to lapse on October 31, and the European Commission has proposed extending it to three years.

But such an extension must be approved by all EU member countries as well as the European Parliament. The effect, critics say, is that France is destroying the spirit of Schengen, since a three-year exception is tantamount to a permanent one, and will only encourage other states more hostile to immigration, such as Hungary, to break European travel laws unilaterally, invoking terrorism.

Shutting down France's borders with EU neighbors is now the top policy proposal of Marine Le Pen.

In the case of the Marseille attacker, a Tunisian national, an identity check at Europe's exterior border would have been enough to make sure he did not enter France. Yet the European Parliament has already passed laws tightening checks at Europe's borders, which will now require all IDs to be verified against a database of stolen or lost documents in Schengen's Information System and other databases.

The fact that France's new anti-terrorism law will double up on aspects of European law, notably at borders, suggests Macron is acting at least in part out of political expediency. Shutting down France's borders with EU neighbors is now the top policy proposal of Marine Le Pen, who opposed Macron in the final round of the presidential election and won about a third of all votes in a runoff.

"The fact is that the French public is extremely sensitive on any topic related to terrorism, and the president is in a corner," said Heisbourg. "Bismarck's adage applies: 'Laws are like sausages, it's better not to see them being made.'"

wow

Jan

Justin Cider

I have never seen so many gay guys in one place !
Must be French men. Viva la no-dfference.

Posted on 10/4/17 | 12:40 AM CET

Aubin Jefaidesbulles

We, we happy band of sisters.

Posted on 10/4/17 | 12:43 AM CET

David Ford

The French have an excellent military and are a close ally to the UK as we are to them.

Posted on 10/4/17 | 2:38 AM CET

Fabian

@Jan

Calm your titties, I’m German.

Posted on 10/4/17 | 2:42 AM CET

Observer

It is a time for EU Commission tostart preparations to activate article 7 of Lisabon treaty against France due to braking EU rule of law same as it did against Poland. Mr. Timermann where are you now? Again EUs double standards. As Orwell wrote in his book 1984 : on animal farm all animals are equal but some animals (France,Germany, Spain etc) are more equal. This is a reason why EU does not have a future.

Posted on 10/4/17 | 6:33 AM CET

Milton38

Why the outcry? Do we live in a perfect world where everyone keeps to the same rules?
It is very laudable by Amnesty etc etc to call for respect for human rights and I agree they should be adhered to and if not they should be enforced; if needs be with force.
So, let’s declare the fact that the majority of Muslims do not adhere to our concept of human rights a case for action. No? Oh I forgot they still have oil and we want to buy it and they have the right to religious freedom, whatever that may be because the Muslim certainly is not free in choosing his religion. Quite a contradiction isn’t it.
So we, a vocal minority, unilaterally declare our vision of Human Rights, only applicable to western cultures where it will be enforced rigorously; excluding of course those that they it is against their religious principles.
Oh yes, principles? Isn’t it a principle of the Christian religion that only the believers in Christ are assured of eternal salvation? Surely it must be then our duty to ensure that non-believers are converted. Ah yes, I forgot that duty only falls to non-Christians, in other times called Heathens.

Posted on 10/4/17 | 8:55 AM CET

Birdman

I can’t say I disagree with the measures that Macron set out. As long as Daesh tries and occasionally succeeds, France must take proportional measures. When the threat abates the law should be rescinded. An even better solution would be to reinforce police and intelligence cooperation at regional scale. But that takes time, and France can’t hold its breath as it is deeply secular and hence a prime target.

“Inexperienced on security issues when he took office,….” What is he experienced in anyway? For want of a better alternative, this man got into the Elysée Palace. The French will realise their mistake as time goes by. France at this juncture needs a very experienced political leader and not a rookie.

Posted on 10/6/17 | 1:42 PM CET

Lonely cod

The liberal political elite continues to embarrass it’s self, continually cleaning up it’s own mess within the ridiculous parameters dreamt up by its own pompous think tanks ,out of which we dare not step, god what a mess we find are selves in.

Posted on 10/8/17 | 12:09 PM CET

ac

Blatant example of EU double standards in truly Orwell’s ‘Animal farm’ spirit: “all animals are equal but some are more equal”.

Just imagine a mayhem that EU Commissars would start if government of Hungary, Czech Republic, Poland or Romania;
– introduced and maintained indefinitely ‘state of emergency’ depriving citizens of their basic rights and undermined basic EU principles like France
– took similar stance and tried to brutally crash opposition like Spanish government !

EU parliament debates, threats of sanctions, triggering article 7 of EU treaty and depriving of voice in the EU would follow immediately. Timmermans, Juncker, Macron would go mad on mainstream media every day on that.

But nothing like that happens in case of:
– Spain – trying to brutally crash democratic movement in Catalonia
– Germany – where Bundestag Scientific Office has just determined that Merkel’s decision to open borders to immigrants from all over the world had no legal grounds, where dieselgate and collusion among car producers has been tolerated for decades,
– France – with constantly extended ‘state of emergency’ depriving citizens of their basic rights which UN human rights experts condemned recently, attacks on basic EU values or breaching 3% budget deficit rule against EU treaties for years.